


Lies My Mother Told Me

by rhye



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-11
Updated: 2013-08-11
Packaged: 2017-12-23 02:31:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/920946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhye/pseuds/rhye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A tumultuous examination of Sirius's relationship with his mother.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lies My Mother Told Me

I know what the first lie was, even though I don't remember it. I can imagine her nuzzling her pointed nose into my black mop of unruly newborn hair and whispering, "I will always love you."

By the time I was twelve, she couldn't even stand the sight of me. By my sixteenth year, she'd burned me off the family tree. By my nineteenth, she's paid a Death Eater to kill me and bring my head back to her as a souvenir.

What could ever be true if those first words to me were an empty lie? She'd spoken other lies, witless lies she had believed about Muggles and Muggleborn wizards. She passed on subtle and seemingly harmless lies at the dinner table: "No, dear, I've not had any note from your Muggle friend." Or perhaps that was true-- she'd had no note because Alain and his entire family had been found dead the week before. Carbon monoxide poisoning, the Muggle paper said. Another lie.

By the time I got to Hogwarts, I knew the color of a lie. I knew that dark green meant a malicious lie, bright green meant a jolly lie in good fun and poor taste, a gray green was for needless lies, and a frothy sea green the color of my mother's eyes was for the best kinds of lies-- lies meant to draw you into the snake pit with your guard down. When Evans declared that she hated Potter, her eyes had been bright, and I knew then it would be a matter of weeks before she recanted.

But no lie measured up to the first. I would never have trusted anyone who declared their love to me. Hate-- hate gave me something to work with, something I could believe in, something I could fight back against.

And I know now the color of truth: red as blood, red as the blood that my friends shed because of me. That is the truth.

Red as the whites of my mother's eyes when she finally spoke the truth to me, red as her nails when she clawed at my throat, and red as the paint on her lips when she called me a Muggle lover and threw me out into a cold summer rain.

Truth has ever been the bloodier choice, but I would always prefer truth to all the lies my mother told me.


End file.
